Australian Word Map

--interjection1. a cry indicating that you are 'safe' during a game. Compare barley, barleys, bars.
--noun2. in chasing games, a place where players are safe from being caught.

Contributor's comments: I agree with the meaning of "bar" as a safety point in a game. I associate it with a game of "tiggy" (which my NSW born wife calls chasey or chasings. Another associated term was "butcher" as in "You can't tig the butcher back!").

Contributor's comments: I grew up in SE Qld and 'bar' was certainly used to refer to a 'safe' area, or also to 'reserve' a place.

Contributor's comments: I grew up in Brisbane in the 1960s. We always used bar to show the pursuer that we were safe and could not be touched.

Contributor's comments: To bar someone is to exclude them, or not to talk to them. For example, I saw Kelly at uni, but I barred her... i.e. I didn't talk to her. It could be like giving someone the cold shoulder, but it is more like a group of people not letting someone in because you don't like something that they did, or something about them.

Contributor's comments: I played chasies in regional NSW, where we said "bar." Some kids said something like "bar lease," which I always thought strange.

Contributor's comments: [in chasing games] That tree is bar (safe). If you touched bar, you would spell it B.A.R.

Contributor's comments: Brisbane kids used the term 'bar' to mean safe during a game.

Contributor's comments: Children playing some games would announce that they were 'bar' when they wanted to take 'time out' for some reason, without suffering a penalty: "Wait. I'm bar while I stop for a drink."

Contributor's comments: [Sydney informant] [Cockylora was a] game similar to British Bulldog, where the player who was "in" was restricted to "tipping" the other players running between two bases or "bar" areas, which were areas where you in which you were safe from being tipped and getting "in".

bar2

--verb1. to convey as a second person on a horse, bicycle or motorcycle.
--noun2. a ride as a secondary passenger. Compare dink, dinky1, dinky-double, donkey1, double, dub, pug.

bar3

--verb to reserve a place, turn, etc.; to 'bags'.Contributor's comments: I grew up in SE Qld and 'bar' was certainly used to refer to a 'safe' area, or also to 'reserve' a place.

Contributor's comments: I grew up along coastal Queensland from Maryborough north to Ingham and the term "bar" was used in my childhood in reference to reserving (say) your place in a game of rounders e.g. "I bar first bat" or in the context of preventing somebody from playing or carrying out some type of action e.g. "Jimmy you're barred from the next game" or "Steelies are barred in this game of marbles."

dink

--verb (t) 1. to convey as a second person on a horse, bicycle, or motorcycle.
--noun2. a ride obtained from being dinked. Compare bar2, dinky1, dinky-double, donkey1, double, dub, pug. Also, double-dink. [perhaps British dialect dink to dandle a baby]Contributor's comments: To sit on the handlebars or crossbar on a bicycle to get a lift; used around Wagga.

Contributor's comments: To give someone a ride on your bike by letting him/her sit on the bar. Usage: Give us a dink; Want a dink? This was commonplace in my primary school years in Casino NSW - not reflected in your regional shading for this term.

Contributor's comments: I grew up in Canberra. We always "dinked" or "double dinked" on our bikes.

Contributor's comments: In SA we also used "dink" or "dinky" or "donkey".

Contributor's comments: The word 'dink', to mean 'doubling on a pushbike', was commonly used in my hometown (Townsville, Nth Qld) in the 50's and 60's.

Contributor's comments: 'Dink' was widely used in the 50s and 60s in the Forestville area of Sydney. It was a common expression among school children at that time.

Contributor's comments: I used the phrase "double-dink" as a child in the late 1950's referring to carrying a second person on a bike - often they would sit on the seat and I would stand and pedal, or they would sit on the handlebars. This was in the northern suburbs of Sydney.

Contributor's comments: I come from Cobar NSW and we used dink with the same meaning.

Contributor's comments: As a boy growing up in Newcastle we also would use the term for all reasons mentioned.

Contributor's comments: I was brought up in the forties/fifties in Western Victoria. The word dink was used commonly as defined. The double dink was also common - but a bit harder to do.

Contributor's comments: As a child in Canberra, we used the term dink, to double up on a bike on handle bars or seat, or carrier.

Contributor's comments: Certainly used around Ipswich during my childhood and youth but I believe used generally in Queensland.

Contributor's comments: Also used around the Lachlan Valley area, particularly double-dink.

Contributor's comments: We used to give "dinks" in the ACT - the person being dinked got to sit on the bicycle's seat, the dinker didn't get to sit, they had to ride standing up.

Contributor's comments: Dink or double dink used in NT, Vic and QLD for 45 years or more.

Contributor's comments: I grew up with dink or double dink in South Western Australia, and later lived in South Australia and heard 'donkey' for riding on the bar of a bike.

Contributor's comments: I was surprised to hear a Dutch friend of mine turn around to me one day in Amsterdam and ask me if I wanted a 'dink'; apparently it is quite commonly known as part of the Australian vernacular.

Contributor's comments: When I was a kid we used the term 'dinky ride'.

Contributor's comments: I think that the usage area for the word 'dink' i.e. to double on a bicycle is more extensive than that noted. This word was used in that capacity in my hometown of Emerald (Qld) right throughout the 80's and 90's (and I assume today). The same applies to 'treadly' and 'deadly treadly' in place of bicycle.

Contributor's comments: The word dink is no longer in use with the rules & laws re bikes. It was often used when I was a child in the Southern Riverina.

Contributor's comments: 'Dink' was also used throughout the Albury region of NSW.

Contributor's comments: 'Dink' is never used in S.E. QLD and no-one knows what I'm talking about when I say 'double' here in Melbourne. It's interesting that some places use or have used "double-dink" while others use strictly one or the other.

Contributor's comments: [Sydney informant] My interpretation of "dink" was on a boy's bike to have someone sitting on the bar in front of the rider. I guess when girl's bikes were invented to "dink" was to carry someone on the supposed carrier frame behind the rider.

Contributor's comments: I heard the word dink, used in Ireland to describe someone going for a ride on a pushbike. It was not used to describe the doubling of someone.

Contributor's comments: While I was at high school in Canberra as recently as two years ago, the term 'dink' was used instead of 'donk'.

Contributor's comments: Also means carrying someone on the bar of a male bike, in FRONT of the rider [Canberra, mid-60's]: "Give me a dink?"

Contributor's comments: Growing up in eastern Perth WA in the 70s, having a second rider on a bicycle was always a 'dink' or a 'dinky'. I never heard the (I assume) Eastern States variation 'double-dink' or just plain 'double' until I moved to NSW in the 1980s.

Contributor's comments: 'To dink' was to ride double on a push bike.

Contributor's comments: We used dink to mean hitching a ride on the back or on the handlebars of a bike when we lived in central Victoria during WW2.

Contributor's comments: I developed a sore bottom as a child in Kalgoorlie, WA by dinking or double dinking on my dad's pushbike.

Contributor's comments: Another from Canberra (in the '50s). Where so many adult cyclists were Dutch, I thought the word "dink" might be, so was interested to hear comment from Amsterdam. As a girl, I thought of dinking as the dinker standing on the pedals and the dinkee occupying the seat. The handlebar or cross-bar situation I thought would apply rather in an adult/child situation, rather than among equals. I'm not sure whether we called that dinking.

Contributor's comments: I grew up in Bourke in 1950's & 60's. 'Double' was the word we usually used and 'dink' was less common but also used for the same meaning. 'Double-dink' is an expression that I associate with the arrival of American cotton farmers in the mid 60's.

Contributor's comments: In Tassie in the 50's and 60's, to "double-dink" or "dink" meant exactly the same thing -- to give or get a ride on someone else's pushbike, usually on the carrier if a boy, or on the bar if a girl!

Contributor's comments: 'Dink' was used in the Bowen (Qld) district when I was growing up there to refer to marbles. It was used in the following context. 'Want a game of dinks?" or "Have you got any dinks on you for a game?"

Contributor's comments: The note on the web site for "dink" says that "the regional meaning of 'dink' is 'to ride your bike with someone else on the back'". In the 1950s when I was a secondary school student attending the local high school in Innisfail in North Queensland it was common, though severely frowned upon by teachers, to "dink" other students on a bike. In practice, this simply meant that the passenger got off just before the school. The accepted meaning of the term, though, was to have the passenger sit in front of the rider (not on the back -- in any case most of the bikes didn't have anything at the back that you could sit on) and the sitting crossways on the top bar of the bike frame, between the arms of the rider stretched out to the handlebars. An experienced rider could pick up an experienced passenger without stopping. The passenger would run alongside the bike while the rider slowed down, steering one-handed. The passenger would jump up and land his backside on the bar, and, with only a little bit of a wobble of the bike, the pair would continue together down the road.

Contributor's comments: In suburban Melbourne in the 70s, 80s and even as young adults in the 90s, we only ever used 'dink' friends on our bikes. Coming to Armidale and Tamworth in northern NSW, I was shocked when no-one understood the term. Apparantly here we 'double'.

Contributor's comments: Growing up in Cessnock, NSW, we only used "double" for taking a second person on a bike; My kids were educated in Wollongong, PNG and Brisbane yet and they used "double". I just asked my 29 yr old son and he's never heard of "dink" whereas as a teacher in Brisbane's West I heard it for the first time about 5 yrs ago.

Contributor's comments: The version of this regionalism in the home page refers only to girls' bikes, without a crossbar as in boys' bikes. On boys' bikes, one was dinked on the crossbar ahead of the rider. In double-dinking the third person rode the handlebars. All dinking is now illegal. There were also "Dinky" brand toys in Victoria, preceding Match-Box toys in the thirties. That trade name undoubtedly related to the meaning "neat" or "small". Today "dink" means "double income, no kids" and is applied to modern yuppies!: "I gave him a dink to the station."

dinky1

--verb (t) (dinkied; dinkying)1. to convey as a second person on a horse, bicycle, or motorcycle.
--noun2. a ride obtained from being dinkied. Compare bar2, dink, dinky-double, donkey1, double, dub, pug.

Contributor's comments: [Adelaide informant] Definitley a donkey when I was a kid. My Mum used the term dub.

Contributor's comments: Used to use the term dinky where I grew up in the middle of Melbourne. So it wasn't restricted to the West where I live now.

Contributor's comments: [Adelaide informant] When I was a kid we used the term 'dinky ride'.

Contributor's comments: Grew up in country and Sydney metropolitan area and it was as you say doubling up on a bicycle etc. Also was applied to any diecast model car or truck after the famous Dinky Toys.

Contributor's comments: Albury NSW in 1950's, to dinky someone was for the rider to use the peddles and the passenger sat on the saddle. Giving a ride on the back seat or luggage part was another matter altogether. I use to hate it as a child, but some children were very competent: "Would you dinky me home please? (i.e. give me a lift on your bike)."

donkey1

--verb (t) 1. to convey as a second person on a horse, bicycle, or motorcycle.
--noun2. a ride obtained from being donkeyed. Compare bar2, dink, dinky1, dinky-double, double, dub, pug.

Contributor's comments: As a child living in Adelaide we always used the word 'donkey' if we wanted a ride on the back of someones bike. It was always, "can I have a donkey"?

Contributor's comments: I grew up with dink or double dink in South Western Australia, and later lived in South Australia and heard 'donkey' for riding on the bar of a bike.

Contributor's comments: We used to 'Donkey up' and "ride donkey" in Kiama and Albion Park (Southern Illawarra).

Contributor's comments: To donkey someone meant to give them a ride on a pushbike as a passenger - they would sit on the cross bar. Probably illegal now for safety reasons, but common years ago: "Hop on the bike with me and I will donkey you home."

double

--verb1. to convey as a second person on a horse, bicycle, or motorcycle.
--noun2. a ride obtained from being doubled. Compare bar2, dink, dinky1, dinky-double, donkey1, dub, pug. Also, double-bank.

Contributor's comments: Growing up on the North Shore of Sydney in the 1960's and 70's the common term for carrying a second person on a pushbike was to "give them a double"

Contributor's comments: As a child growing up around the Lake Macquarie area, "Give us a double?" meant asking for a lift on anything from a horse to a scooter but it was most commonly applied to being given a lift on the bar or the seat of a pushbike.

Contributor's comments: 'dub' was the only term in use in Goulburn in the 60s and 70s.

Contributor's comments: Growing up in Wynnum in the 60s, we just called it "doubling". eg. Will you double me to school on your bike?

Contributor's comments: I grew up in Bourke in 1950's & 60's. 'Double' was the word we usually used and 'dink' was less common but also used for the same meaning. 'Double-dink' is an expression that I associate with the arrival of American cotton farmers in the mid 60's.

Contributor's comments: I knew this term as "a double" and it meant to give someone a lift on a bike when they were sitting on the bar between the handle bars and seat. Their weight never seemed right if they sat on the luggage rack "rat-trap" behind the seat. Could only be done on a boy's bike as girls bikes had no bar back then.

Contributor's comments: In Adelaide this was known as a double-dink.

dub

--verb1. to convey as a second person on a horse, bicycle or motorcycle.
--noun2. a ride as a secondary passenger. Compare bar2, dink, dinky1, dinky-double, donkey1, double, dub, pug.Contributor's comments: 'dub' was the only term in use in Goulburn in the 60s and 70s.

Contributor's comments: As a kid in regional NSW, I used the word dub. When I moved to Canberra, they had no idea what I was talking about and I changed to dink. I have since moved to Brisbane and have referred back to dub.

pug

--verb (t) (pugged; pugging)1. to convey a second person on a horse, bicycle, or motorcycle.
--noun2. a ride obtained from being pugged. Compare bar2, dink, dinky1, dinky-double, donkey1, double, dub. [? British dialect pug to pull]